Trapped Toddler Parents of Winter 2020/21 Support Thread - Puddlesuits at the ready!

[ReallySpicyCurry]

Are you the parent of a small child who doesn't yet sit still for more than five minutes? Do local lockdowns mean there are no baby and toddler groups for miles? Are you sick of walking the same three routes every day since March? Then come and join our support thread! I have started this after some of us had a good moan on a thread in AIBU ("To be worried about staying sane stuck inside all winter with a 2 year old?") because I thought it might be nice to share ideas/activities/general moans and concerns, over what is probably going to be a tricky winter for those of us with babies and toddlers.

Don't forget the answer to all your prayers though... The ever reliable puddlesuit. Puddlesuits are absolutely mandatory this year, and you are expected to wrestle your child into one and make them jump in puddles daily. If your child goes blue with cold, administer a swift dose of hot chocolate and hope your local Amazon delivery driver gets move on with your latest order of kinetic sand/playdough/ball pit/stickers. Failing all else, Peppa Pig is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, in October as in March.

Urgh hope everyones had a better day. Small still not quite walking as he doesn't dare let go child has been a pain from the minute he woke up.

He's ignored my lovely created tuff tray and the den full of twinkly lights I kindly made for him and decided instead that trying to practice walking using my ponytail as a supporting handle is more fun... We also went out for yet another walk and sods law that the only rain we've had all day decided to fall mid way through it. Is it bedtime yet... I think and are required.

Mine's been quite good. Baby seems happy and toddler has done some firework art and made oat cookies. Also managed to marshal both of them out of the door for a morning and an afternoon walk. And they napped so I did some cleaning in the kitchen (not that you can tell now!) Exhausted now though, counting down the minutes until DH gets back.

I'll join you for @LittleMissLockdown

The not-quite-walking stage is exhausting, I feel for you. Hopefully kiddo cracks it soon.

@KiriAndLou

I'll join you for *@LittleMissLockdown*

The not-quite-walking stage is exhausting, I feel for you. Hopefully kiddo cracks it soon.

For myown sanity and the safety of my hair and now liver I sincerely hope so. 🤣

Anyone else dreading bedtime and the inevitable lack of sleep due to it sounding like a war zone outside??

@footprintsintheslow good tip re the decorations for the tree. I suspect DD will be at ours like a moth to a flame this year, so it's all about distraction and compromise for us

Glorious weather here which is to last for a while. No Bonfire Night themes for us, it isn't really a thing here and I was at work today. Planning to do some balance bike sessions at the park this weekend - DD got one for her second birthday and we haven't had it out in a while, I think she'll take to it more now.

I am pleased to say that our spare wheel arrived in the post, DH did manly things with a screwdriver, and the £3 charity shop Wheelybug is as good as new. DD is currently having a last scoot before bed.

@LittleMissLockdown ahh how annoying! The twinkly den sounds lovely

Joining in! Some amazing ideas here. Thank you! And lovely babies, congratulations .

I have a 2.5 year old and a 3.5 month old. The last lockdown was horrific as I was heavily pregnant with HG. To all the ones with new babies I can assure you having a newborn and a toddler is a doddle compared to pregnant with one!

I'll post any ideas we have but I've been shamelessly trying yours out. I'm not a naturally crafty mum (that's why I pay nursery ) but we have enjoyed cloud dough tinkerlab.com/cloud-dough-exploration/

I've had a mixed bag of a day, attempted some firework painting that went okay until DS kept walking off and when I would go to put it away he would say he wanted to paint and then didnt. This repeated for half an hour until I lost my patience and shouted just do it at him. He then told me I shouted at him to loud. Not my finest hour of parenting.... We went out for a bike ride in the afternoon and crunched lots of leaves so it did improve

@OhRosalind last year we bought charity shop books and wrapped them up in brown paper and stacked them like a Christmas tree for our advent calendar.

@LittleMissLockdown twinkly lights den sounds lovely. Any photos? Not for evidence but for inspiration!!

@ReallySpicyCurry we have a lidls balance bike and I've never given it to her as at 2.5 I think it'll be too heavy yet. How old is yours? Mine is also on the short side so not sure she'd take to it yet.

@Motherofmonsters if it makes you feel better my daughter told me "I've done another bloody wee in my pants now". So she's obviously heard that a few times.

Today we didn't do any of the firework craft I intended but we filled out day with...
🎇 short walk to collect sticks.
🎇chalked on path out the front in the sun.
🎇ate porridge outside in the sun.
🎇cleaned away lentils from tuff spot. She seemed to love this activity.
🎇made a picture of fire with sticks from walk and tissue on a paper plate.
🎇Fireworks walk in the dark and sparklers stuck in a carrot handle. What a great tip from this thread. Thanks PP

Now she knows what fireworks are we will attempt some craft tomorrow.

Also I've set the tuff spot up as a pompom tweezer game. See photo. She was going to have it today to play with but she wouldn't put her clothes on so I said if she didn't come now there would be no time left to play before dinner. She was still naked at dinner so I put the lid on the tuff tray but at least it's new and exciting for tomorrow.

We don't normally do all this stuff but with lockdown and this thread it's the perfect storm.

twinkly lights den sounds lovely. Any photos? Not for evidence but for inspiration!!

Sadly no pictures at present. I'll try and grab a few tomorrow as it's up in the nursery. I'm thinking if tomorrow is as difficult as today I might move into it!! 🤣

@LittleMissLockdown

Urgh hope everyones had a better day. Small still not quite walking as he doesn't dare let go child has been a pain from the minute he woke up.

I had a never letting goer and the tip that finally worked was holding something between us - so you hold a wooden spoon/similar at one end and they hold the other end. Off you go walking together and then you quietly let go of your end. They still feel like they're holding onto a support and carry on solo (in my case, it then took a few days for DC to work out they could walk without clutching the TV remote )

So glad to have found this thread as I work out how to manage winter/lockdown with a toddler, look forward to joining in more.

Something that worked really well yesterday was cutting up the junk mail into strip's and throwing them round and making firework noises! I haven't got a shredder but scissors worked just as well and didn't take long at all. Also made use of the annoying farmfoods promo leaflets we regularly receive

Also put it into toddlers dumper trucks and tipped it out which was also fun

@PinkDaydreams ripping stuff up is very satisfying especially crappy flyers and an excellent exercise for little fingers' strength which supports fine motor skills.

I had a never letting goer and the tip that finally worked was holding something between us - so you hold a wooden spoon/similar at one end and they hold the other end.

Thank you for the tip. I shall try today and let you know if we have any success.

Also so sorry to disapoint but there will be no photos of the twinkly light den as at about 2am small person woke screaming at some very loud fireworks and when I went into the nursery I tripped over a toy Seahorse and promptly fell onto it! This Mummy has decided she really hates fireworks .

All the for you littlemiss , they are so one-track minded when they’re in that almost walking stage it’s hard to interest them in other stuff.

The book Christmas tree ideal is lovely but charity shops aren’t a thing here so could work out a bit pricey.

I’m liking the sound of cloud dough, with some cocoa powder mixed in it could be building site mud. Ripping stuff up and chucking it about sounds quite cathartic.Really appreciate all these ideas. I have a huge list on the fridge and it cheers me up each morning knowing I don’t have to think of something.

Oh no *littlemiss, I can imagine the 2am rage when that happened.

Today has gone okay, DS was at nursery for 3hours this morning and then we had a day at home doing playdough with some diggers and then building a track for his cars. I didn't fancy going out in the wind especially as DD already has a runny nose.

I’ve been at work today but these are the fireworks we made out of toilet rolls and ripping up tissue paper. They threw them in the air for a bit.

I’m going to try the cloud sand tomorrow, will let you know how it goes!

@OhRosalind yes it wouldn't get expensive if you can't do second hand. Do you have Facebook marketplace or maybe you can find a set of books on amazon and then split them up?

@Postmanbear I've been avoiding rockets but your look pretty simple and manageable for me.

Today in our house the new tuff tray was a total flop.... the one with pompoms, chunky tweezers and masking tape web. She literally hated it and kept saying "but does it do?" Even though I showed her it just did not appeal. But she absolutely loved ripping all the masking tape off so that was good.

We did the cut toilet roll fireworks painting today and it's was brill. Super easy, really effective, she loved it and no brushes to wash at the end.

Did some playdoh this afternoon. DS insists that it must be made into one large ball and two small balls (only give him one small tub at a time because I’m a control freak 😂) and he just carries them around becoming periodically angry if they deviate from ball shapes. At one point he started having a meltdown about ‘not a snowman!!!’ When two balls touched 😂😂😂 Not quite the creative play I’d imagined!

@PolarBearStrength that made me laugh! Probably not funny in the moment... I do find you have to find the humour and joy (even if it’s later once you’ve had a glass of wine) in the total irrational conviction of toddlers!

Today we went to the playground. It’s nice, perfect toddler size equipment. Except it’s not fully gated. And when I moved some bricks holding the gate open and closed it, terror tot marched over and stacked them up so he could reach the latch on the gate!

Tomorrow I’m planning on copying whoever said they have a list of activities on the fridge. Sorry can’t find your comment now but I think this will help!

@WeSearchedHereWeSearchedThere it was very funny! Just a bit frustrating!

My husband is working on a uni assignment all weekend so it's up me to carry on single parenting.

We are attempting a volcano to go on the tuff spot made from plaster cast bandage. I thought for storage it could hang on the wall out of the way.

I might be crazy but thought we'd also try this today as a continuation of bonfire night...you paint it on.... so that's one activity then you hose pipe it off like a fire officer! It's bloody freezing here so I think I'll have a warm bubble bath at the ready afterwards. Three activities in one! So that's a total of 23 minutes taken care of out of the next 48 hours!!!

Oh my goodness. I know it's not activity related, but I have to share... DD slept through the night for the second time in her life. She went to bed at 7pm and woke up there half an hour ago. Not only that, but last night after singing reading and singing to her, I told her I was leaving to do a few jobs and she should close her eyes and go to sleep (child has been rocked and fed to sleep every night of her life)

I watched her on the monitor - she hopped out of bed and wandered around, I could see this massive fuzzy head moving across the screen as she chatted to her toys (or our ghost) thought to myself, oh she'll call for me soon no doubt... I looked away... Looked back and the fuzzy head was poking out of the top of her blankets and she was sound asleep! She'd just toddled back and put herself to bed. No tears, no fuss. Please please please let this be forever now

@footprintsintheslow brilliant idea to get them to hose it off! You could totally run with a whole fire engine theme now. I do love a nice red fire engine.

@WeSearchedHereWeSearchedThere
at your clever brick stacking child.

I am also going to write a list of activities for the fridge. I have one of those magnetic white boards stuck to mine, so one side can be meal planning and the other activity planning.

I really struggle with November, it is my worst month, but here we are, a week down already and a week closer to the solstice and light coming back

@footprintsintheslow my DS would love that fire on the tuff tray, saving that one for later!

@ReallySpicyCurry that’s great news, a good nights sleep makes everything easier!

This is my tuff tray for this morning, not very exciting but they like it.